


Disarm

by InkSplatterM



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: 5+1 Things, Denial of Feelings, Kissing, M/M, Rivals to Lovers, Swordfighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-08
Updated: 2020-02-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:54:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22621345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InkSplatterM/pseuds/InkSplatterM
Summary: Five times Dedue disarmed Felix, and one time Felix got his own back---Felix moved.The sun shone brightly, making the wood of their training weapons gleam.And then Felix was on his ass, sword flown from his hands, and Dedue’s axe was now up on his shoulder, a textbook perfect Lover’s Guard.---Minor mentions of the rest of the Blue Lions, Ferdinand, Lorenz, Claude, Marianne, and Petra. Background Marianne/Dimitri.
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Dedue Molinaro
Comments: 5
Kudos: 41





	Disarm

Axe versus sword. 

It should have been easy. Professor Eisner was technically demonstrating that your weapon didn’t matter so long as you kept it between yourself and your opponent, or you could get out of the way. It couldn’t be completely true. An axe could shatter a lance, but they were so slow. A sword fighter could easily slip in no matter how the axe was used to block. 

Felix tightened his grip around the hilt of his sword as he brought it up to a Window Guard. Dedue had his axe in a low guard, somewhere between Wyvern’s Tooth and Half Iron Gate. Waiting. 

The Window Guard was perfect for Felix to use here. He had so many options. He could thrust, he could sidestep and slice. If Dedue brought his axe up to do an overhand strike it would be too easy to use that force against him. 

Waiting, Dedue stayed in place but shifted just enough to settle solidly into Wyvern’s Tooth Guard. His left hand was against his hip, his right further up the haft. The axe was held so that it had its blade down. Right, he’d come up with the “false edge”. Dedue’s entire chest was technically unguarded, protecting his lower left side the most, while leaving all his upper half open. Even so… for all his size, even with this weapon, Dedue could be quick. 

Felix tightened his hands even more. 

“Any time now, gentlemen.” The professor sounded bored. 

If only this was actual sparring, where he could really go all out against Dedue, show him what a real warrior can do. 

Felix moved. 

The sun shone brightly, making the wood of their training weapons gleam. 

And then Felix was on his ass, sword flown from his hands, and Dedue’s axe was now up on his shoulder, a textbook perfect Lover’s Guard. 

How-? How had that happened? It was going to be a thrust to the heart, an easy blow. It should have been easy. Somewhere the tight twirl of Felix’s blade to get around the axe was used against him. His sword was torn out of his hands instead.

“As I was saying,” Professor Eisner walked over to where the training blade had landed and held it over their shoulder like a club as they spoke. “What you hold doesn’t matter, what they hold doesn’t matter. The main differences are going to be how well you can utilize what you are holding. Overconfidence and reliance on old wives tales from the dueling salon will get you killed.”

The bell tower rang. 

“That’s the end of class. Professor Casagranda will meet you in the normal classroom for faith magic classes after lunch.” 

Felix stayed on the ground, rubbing his hands and scowling. A large hand came into his vision in a silent offer to help him up. 

“Good attempt.” Dedue said. 

“Feh, don’t pity me. I won’t go easy on you next time.” Felix pushed Dedue’s hand aside

“Assuming already that you’ll defeat me?”

“Of course.”

\----

The greenhouses at Garreg Mach served a dual purpose. It allowed the monastery to have fresh vegetables and fruits all year around, and it allowed the students to grow some of their own plants for fun or as part of work with the greenhouse keepers. 

Felix did not frequent the green houses. 

His preferred space for his weekends was going to the training ground and otherwise avoiding any space where the Boar would be spending his time. Which also meant that Felix largely avoided being around the Boar’s dog. 

It did not bother him. 

It was not why he ended up at the greenhouses when he walked by, seeing the larger than life silhouette, and walked inside. 

Felix looked around inside, letting himself get lost between the overhanging foliage that always took over the space near the door. Coming in from outside, it felt like he had walked into a wall of heat. His hair stuck to his face, and his hands slicked with sweat. The scent that accompanied it spoke of the multitude of plants that grew side by side. The professor had a tendency to give the greenhouse keepers strange mixes of seeds they had found. Sometimes the mix would be Morfis plums and violets, another batch would be weeds, pitcher flowers, and onions

“Felix.”

Felix did not jump. He absolutely did not jump in place. Felix turned around to glare at Dedue who had come up behind him. 

They stared at each other for a long moment. In the torchlight, Dedue’s skin gained deeper shadows, and his face looked more cut from stone than usual. The gold piece hanging from his ear glittered. Felix couldn’t look away from it, even though he wanted to concentrate on glaring up at Dedue’s face. 

Dedue sighed and forced a watering can into Felix’s hands. 

“Start watering the southeast corners. Do not water the section I am working on. The plants there do not favor wet conditions.”

“What?”

Dedue raised an eyebrow. 

“Fine.”

They worked in silence, Felix tending the section that Dedue had given him and Dedue tending his strange plants that didn’t need water. Felix looked over his shoulder, taking in Dedue’s broad shoulders, his arched back, and the gentle way that he handled the stems and leaves. 

The Boar didn’t deserve him. Dedue would be the first one harmed if he went on another rampage, just because of proximity

Felix scowled at the thought. What did he care if Dedue died? Foolish. 

\------

There was a certain part of Felix that didn’t know why he was going to an old ruin. Sure the class had made that silly promise, “let’s meet up again in five years for the Millenium Festival”, but then life intervened. The Professor disappeared, the regent was assassinated, Di- the Boar was put on the execution block, and Dedue probably with him. Where the Boar went, Dedue would follow, after all, like the loyal dog that he was. Even into death.

The ruins of Garreg Mach and the town around it were bleak. What was left of its destroyed towers cut the horizon as desperate fingers reaching up for help that would never come. The gorge that had opened up at the foot of the mountain still yawned widely, the edges jagged and tooth like, waiting for another meal to fall into it. 

“Geez, no need to look so grim.” Sylvain walked up behind Felix, arms crossed behind his head. “It’s not like there’s going to be a change in the battle lines. They haven’t changed for five years and our old men can hold the Duchy’s forces at bay while we’re here.” 

Ingrid stood next to him, the reigns for her wyvern and Sylvain’s horse in hand, looking up at the monastery’s castle. She confessed to Felix as they had flown here that she didn’t think anyone else would show up, but at least if they came one promise to the dead wouldn’t linger. Felix had scoffed then -- the dead were dead, what did they care -- and he scoffed now at Sylvain. 

“We should be careful. There’s no telling what sort of bandits moved in here while the war’s been on.” Felix said. 

As if his words were prophecy, the clash of metal on metal sounded from the south west, just over the half destroyed wall. Felix moved first, not needing to mount. He leaped over the wall, clearing the top of it and turning his landing into a controlled tumblr that ended with one sword drawn. Ingrid and Sylvain were able to quickly overtake him with their mounts, jumping and flying over the walls. 

Thieves. Bandits. Scavengers picking again over the corpse of a treasure vault. Fighting and fleeing from two spots of gold. The Professor, alive -- How were they alive? -- and Dimitri, the Boar. Tension left Felix’s shoulders, sudden enough that he could identify the individual muscle groups that had been holding that tension like a vault held treasure. Dimitri was alive, things could go well now, for everyone. The resistance had been holding, but vengeance for the fallen could only take people so far. And then Dedue had to be with him.

Between cutting down the enemy, Felix kept waiting for that ever present shadow to show up and block blows to the Boar’s back. He never showed. Maybe he was just in a different part of the village?

When every bandit was dead, Felix took an accounting of who was there and who wasn’t. Ashe and that familiar Knight of Seiros, Mercedes and Annette, himself with Sylvain and Ingrid. 

The realization of who was missing hit like a punch to the gut. 

Dedue hadn’t come. He wouldn’t be coming. 

Being near the Boar killed him.

\-------

It wasn’t that they had been losing on the bridge. 

No, most everyone had ran up ahead, taking out the guard post then moving on to the other side. Marianne looked stricken as soldiers wearing Gloucester colors entered the fray from the north west, but she still charged Aura’s light around her fists. Annette and Mercedes were back to back and sweating, working in sync as they flashed through spell after spell. Ashe had ridden to the north to take control of a ballista. Sylvain and Ingrid - one on land, the other in the air - were flanking the Boar and the Professor, both of whom charged forward into the Empire’s ranks like a pair of ten pin balls. 

Everyone forgot to defend their backs. 

Felix stayed in the fort on the East side of the bridge, rolling his shoulders to keep Aegis’ straps from digging in as it hung on his back. He hated being right. Fucking Acheron warping in with armored knights and cavaliers. Of course no one else noticed, focused as they were on Ferdinand von fucking Aegir and Lorenz fucking Gloucester. 

Being in the fort’s entrance meant that Acheron’s battalion had to come for him one by one, but that didn’t mean that the choke hold miraculously allowed Felix more room to dodge and his enemies less. They were both stuck, weapons flailing, and Aegis glowing with a bright golden light. He was able to kill most of them, but not without taking blows. And not without losing Aegis. It spun off his back and out of his hand when Felix dodged a blow meant for his chest, but still cut through the shield’s straps. 

Acheron hung back the whole time. Felix had just about forgotten that he was around until a blast of Fire knocked him off his feet. 

“I’ve got you!” Acheron screamed, following up with Blizzard. Felix rolled to the side, out of the way of most of the ice shards, but enough still met their mark so to throw Felix’s sword to the other side of the hallway. Acheron summoned a ball of flame, holding it in his hand, as he advanced. His moustache made his triumphant grin look ridiculous, perfectly curled as it was. Felix wanted to laugh. So this was how he’d die, at the hands of an idiot. Felix snarled, baring his blood edged teeth.

“Unsightly, aren’t you. Better that I remove you now before you stain my --urk!” 

Behind Archeron was Dedue, gripping Aegis in both hands. The point of the shield was covered in blood. 

Felix had forgotten how quiet Dedue could walk. How he’d sometimes just appear next to the Boar, as if he’d always been there but you knew for sure that he had been in the next room. Felix hated it so much. Dedue was the only person who could consistently sneak up on him. It didn’t make sense. He was just so big. A shield in human form, protecting everyone. Now Dedue was even protecting him. 

Acheron fell forward, his body going to its knees then flat on its face. The red blood was bright on Acheron’s yellow clothing. It was an odd mirror. Red on gold on the ground, red on gold in the air. Shadows darkened on the ground, pooling slick and opaque. Shadows darkened the air, pooling as a storm cloud around Dedue’s hands.

Storm clouds like those that swallowed Miklan Gautier.

That got Felix to his feet and tearing his shield from Dedue’s hands. “Give me that.” Didn’t he remember what would happen? It was a Hero’s relic and unless Dedue suddenly developed a Fraldarius Crest while he was dead, there really would be no coming back for him. 

\------

It had to be addressed that Dedue had saved Felix’s life. 

This was not a conversation that Felix really wanted to have. It felt wrong. He was not Dimitri, and he was from Feargus. There was no reason for Dedue to swoop in and save him like some big damn hero out of a story.

“You defended me in battle. Why?”

“His Highness does not wish for our military strength to be depleted. The loss of your strength would be significant.”

“You are a colossal idiot.” Felix didn’t want to question why it felt like the world had dropped out from under him at that proclamation. It was a practical response. Rational. But at the same time, how could Dedue not see that he himself had value? “One slip-up and you would have died. You think he would've been happy about that?”

“No, I do not.”

“Then why protect me? I thought you were his mindless weapon, his sword and shield.” A mindless weapon wouldn’t care. It served to be used by whomever picked it up and pointed it at their enemy. Be a good knight and don’t think for yourself, just think of the glory that your death would bring to the people left behind. But Dedue was singularly a person who did not think about glory.

“I heard about your brother.”

What? Felix gave Dedue a sharp look. What did Glenn have to do with this? 

“He was at Duscur. He died to protect His Highness.”

“He did, but I don't see that that has to do with anything.” Felix crossed his arms tightly over his chest. A snarl reached the edges of his voice. “Are you repaying some kind of debt? I hope you're not going to praise his death. I heard enough of that from my old man.” 

“I will not praise it, then. Instead I will say I would have done the same in his position. Is it really so unnatural to put one's life on the line to protect a brother in arms?”

Red bled into Felix’s vision. ‘Unnatural’? ‘Unnatural’ to willingly put one’s own life at risk for someone else? Yes. Humans, people, had a drive to kill. They then prettied it up with words like ‘chivalry’ and ‘morals’ and ‘justice’. Words that all ultimately were lies when the end result for the gallant knight was the same as the bandit: people died. They voided their bowels, bled, died, and became a corpse. Stinking up the land until they decayed or some other soul took pity on the body and buried it. 

So yes, it was unnatural. Especially for someone who had said quite clearly that he considered himself an object, something with no thought and just ready to be let loose wherever he was pointed. And yet, what did that say about Felix himself?

“To hear a rabid dog call me a "brother in arms"...” The words were out of Felix’s mouth before he could stop his impetuous tongue. He immediately cursed himself. Some way for him to try to find out why and say something close to a thank you. 

Dedue looked down on him, and a part of Felix’s soul quailed at his expression. Serene, forgiving, as if he already knew the shadowed sections of Felix’s heart and mind that never had torch light brought to their halls. 

“Your insults are merely an attempt to avoid addressing me as what I am. I am a man of Duscur. Yet you were concerned for my life.”

What did being from Ducar have to do with anything? A man from Duscur was the same as a man from Feargus when they were both on the battlefield and needing to make split second decisions that could mean life or death.

“‘Concerned’ is a strong word. Your death would have been unpleasant. That's all.” That was all. The swooping feeling in his gut meant nothing. It wasn’t important. Felix could almost convince himself, if he said it enough.

“Coming from you, that is enough.”

“What's that supposed to mean? I just meant—Never mind! OK, go ahead, protect me. But if you act like a fool and get yourself killed, I'll kill you.”

“How can you kill me, if I am already dead?”

The flash of red that suffused Felix was distinctly different this time around. Heat, flushing his cheeks and turning that feeling in his stomach into something more similar to falling into Ailell’s lava pits and thanking the earth for the pleasure. 

“I... You-you know what I meant!”

_ Don’t die before your time. Don’t be killed becuase I did something stupid and you felt that you needed to lift me up. Don’t throw your life away like so many others have. Don’t force me to stand on the sideline of yet another funeral where people talked about what a good death it was. _ Maybe Dedue could read that or maybe he could not, Felix had turned around and raced away as fast as he could without running. 

_ Don’t die before I understand my own heart. _

\-----

The marriage of Dimitri Alexandre Blaidydd and Marianne von Edmund was the event of the year. Dedue should have felt honored that a man of his position was among such luminaries, and he was, but he couldn’t help but to feel a certain amount of absence. 

Claude von Reigen and Petra MacNairy attended, representing their respective countries as allied powers. Sat in a wheeled chair next to Claude was Lorenz Gloucester, Almyra’s ambassador to Fodlan. Petra’s ambassador to Fodlan, Ferdinand von Aegir, stood behind and to the left of her, his neatly folded and pinned up sleeve hidden from easy gawking. 

Dedue, of course, was Dimitri’s best man. There wasn’t even a question about it. When Dimitri had started to broach the topic to him weeks ago, Dedue said yes before His Highness had even gotten out two words. Dedue’s prescience was helped by the fact that Marianne had spoken to him long before Dimitri did. 

“I know you and Dima are close,” She said, wringing her hands into her skirt. Though she had largely dropped her nervous mannerisms since staying with her adoptive father, in private they would appear. “I want to make sure that I’m not stepping between something already present.” Her hair was loose. It framed her face in river-like waves. Dedue reflected that years ago, when they were both students, her expression would have been shadowed from her head being bent down. In this moment, her expression was resolute, staring at him right in the eyes. She firmly wants to stay with Dimitri, and she also will firmly step back should Dedue tell her that there was more than a platonic bond between himself and the prince.

“His Majesty has my loyalty, and my friendship. If there was to be anything more than that between us, I feel it would have been established long ago. I am glad though, to know that he has someone who cares for the state of his heart as I do.” Dedue said. He bowed to her, bending at the waist. Perfunctory, perhaps, but sincere. 

“Thank you for your blessing, Dedue. I’m going to ask him to marry me. You will probably be able to guess after I have done so.” 

“I look forward to it, Your Majesty.”

Marianne blushed a pretty pink around her shy smile, laughing into a fist. She may have thought that there was a chance that Dimitri would have said no, but Dedue knew his friend. His Majesty would say yes, having found another kindred soul in the unlikeliest of places, who was unbeholden to the person that he had been before the Tragedy of Duscur changed everything. 

Dedue felt that the subsequent ceremony was beautifully done. The Professor, in their new role as Arch-Bishop of the Church, had read the vows for them, looking distinctly uncomfortable in their regalia, but nevertheless ecstatic about their students’ nuptials. They had offered Garreg Mach’s grand cathedral for the event, which allowed for both the political and spiritual meanings to ring true.. 

Most of the guests looked happy. If not happy, then at least content to believe that finally the war years could be put behind them. Fodlan had a royal couple, after all. With that was the promise of children and a continuing dynasty. There was one face that Dedue noticed was not in any sort of pleasant expression at all. Felix had spent the entire ceremony looking at Dedue. Most would have thought that the sour expression was the same as he always wore. Dude could see how it has shifted from concern to relief. 

Felix gestured with his head to a side door as Marianne and Dimitri exited the cathedral with most of the guests following. Dedue met him there and they escaped the crowd together. They went through the aerial mews where students would run the flying patrols and pick weeds.

“I thought he would end up marrying you.” Felix said, giving Dedue a once over as if the marriage ceremony had been a strike that had gotten through Dedue’s armor.

“I did not think the Sothis Church allowed that.”

“They don’t.” 

Ah, typical Felix, blunt as a blacksmith’s hammer. Dedue raised an eyebrow at him, waiting for an elaboration. 

Felix didn’t give it to him. “So you and Dimitri aren’t together?”

“No. Not in the manner you are implying”

“Good.” 

Felix kissed the same way he wielded a sword, with confidant, savage finesse. 

There was nothing Dedue could do but respond to it. His mind went blank, taken aback, then raced forward trying to determine why. Even so his body automatically moved into the next action, like a martial set play they had gone through hundreds of times. Felix’s waist nearly fit in the circle of Dedue’s hands. The detail was distracting, like the detail of how Felix’s hands were on his shoulders to pull himself up. 

They broke the kiss slowly. Felix’s frown intense, bordering on angry to cover up something else. 

“Why?” Dedue breathed the word. The kiss has been something of fantasy, plucked from places that Dedue dared not think of. Felix was angry at the world that took his brother, that took his friend’s innocence, there couldn’t be room for anything else. Except he had showed patience, sincerity, care. Impulsive, yes, Felix let his mouth get away from him more than once, but he was able to learn. 

“Why not?” Felix shrugged, blushing, the color fetching on his cheek bones. “Would you let me do it again?”

“Yes.”

**Author's Note:**

> Classes Imagined for this fic: Ingrid - Wyvern Rider/Wyvern Lord, Sylvain - Dark Knight, Felix - Swordmaster, Dedue - Armored Knight/Fortress, Marianne - Bishop/Holy Knight, Mercedes - Bishop/Gremory, Annette - Warlock/Gremory, Dimitri - High Lord, Byleth - Swordmaster/Enlightened One, Ashe - Bow Knight. 
> 
> Many thanks to unrivaled_tapestry for beta-ing!
> 
> You can find me on Twitter @InkSplatterM and on tumblr at mwritesink. ^-^


End file.
